The speaker was a tall, powerfully built man, of about thirty. His sallow, sunken cheeks and wasted limbs, marked him a recent victim of fever. Nature had given him a manly, open countenance; but over it there rested a reckless, fierce expression. His abrupt address was not unpleasant to me; it was in keeping with Western frankness; but there was a something, illy defined in his looks, that made me suspect an evil design. "I came down from St. Paul in the boat this morning," he continued, "and it's dull enough here. Up the river a mile or so there is a scythe-snath factory; I want to see it myself. You seem to be alone. What say you to going, too?" It was a wild, lonely path, but I was in the mood for a change from the present monotony, and felt also a desire, after a moment's thought, to study my new acquaintance, and assented. My companion proved to be a person of varied information. He had evidently seen much of the world, and I became interested in him; yet could not help watching him suspiciously. Why did he leave the bar-room and select me as the companion of his walk? Why did he wish to walk at all,—he so feeble and weary-looking? And then there was an occasional glare of the eye, and it seemed to me a look of desperation. This mingling of the winning and the repulsive in the man kept my faculties observingly alert. Instinctively, however, I assumed a careless demeanor. He was not artful enough to be a villain by profession, and that was clear, yet, before the walk was half completed, I could not divest myself of a sense of personal danger. "Come," said he, after inspecting the manufactory, "the bluffs shade the way, let's keep on up the river a piece?" He was disappointed at my declining. On our return, he spoke often of the pleasures of foot journeys, and at length stated that he was to leave next morning for D—, a town some twenty miles distant; said he intended walking there, and pressed me to join him, as my course homeward lay in that direction. This, also, I declined. That evening, as I was going out to a religious meeting, a second stranger accosted me,—"Are you a clergyman, sir?"